


this starless city [pt. 1]

by spacestationtrustfund



Series: Gal Pals [a band AU] [1]
Category: Centrepeace - Zelda Sabel, Marked - Ash Zenz, The Magpie Ballads - Vale Aida
Genre: Alternate Universe - Forties Pop Punk Girl Band AU, F/F, crossover to end all crossovers, well this was an adventure all right
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-20
Updated: 2016-11-20
Packaged: 2018-09-01 00:40:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8600302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacestationtrustfund/pseuds/spacestationtrustfund
Summary: Saskia leaned against the railing, taking in the swell and expanse of the city. Up here, anything was possible; up here, she never had to be afraid again. (Self-indulgence in the highest degree.)





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sonatine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonatine/gifts), [dirtybinary](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dirtybinary/gifts).



> This fic has an audience of about three people: me, Val, & Zelda. So yeah, have an AU in which the favourite ass-kicking ladies from our respective queer fantasy genre-subverting stories are all inexplicably in a 40s pop punk girl band. (Let it never be said that anything I write has meaning.)

The set list was fucking _insane_ .  
  
And that was saying something, considering how fucking insane their lives had been during the past eight months since they'd come to New York.  
  
Lix took a breath, then slammed her notebook down on the speaker next to her with a decisive _smack_ of paper on vinyl and velvet. Lix had a tendency to _slam_ things, no matter her mood -- she was just as likely to kick shut the door to the studio out of delight as out of anger -- but this time Saskia could see the fury on her face.

“Who fucking leads this band?” Lix snapped, pressing a hand against her thigh, fingers curled like talons. “I write the lyrics, I sing, I pull my fucking weight -- I get to have a fucking say in this! I _hate_ that line, the backup _blows_ , the key is all off no matter what _all_ the rest of you say --”

“You’re not the only person in this band either, L,” Shandei said, cold as the New York winds shrieking outside the windows. “You don’t get _more_ say just because you’re the lead.”

And I write most of your songs, Saskia didn't say. Lix had a talent with singing, captivating a crowd, enrapturing the audience; Saskia skulked in the background, wrote the lyrics for Lix to spit out through red-lipsticked lips, sang backup vocals and watched, and watched, and waited.

“Seriously,” said S with a shrug, shivering as she pulled her blue greatcoat tighter about her shoulders. “Can we take a break from the entitlement bullshit? We’re all cool. All of us girls. Now, let's go to a café or something -- I’m from Florida, pal, I can't handle this cold weather.”

Lix glowered.

“Lix,” said Saskia suddenly. “Please.”

There was a moment of pause, then Lix’s face set. “Fine,” she said, all careless whimsy. “You do you. Go to a goddamn café. I’ll be at the recording studio with Savonn.”

She slammed the door behind her when she left. Shandei and S exchanged looks, eyes rolling and mouths smirking, sisterly in their camaraderie. Saskia stared after Lix, watching the door with its stupid handwritten sign -- _SGB Recording Studios --_ and tapped her fingers on the speaker, a melody forming in her mind.

 

-

 

New York was cold, colder than Lix, even. The snow crunched under their shoes as they made their way down the streets, arms linked like any old group of girls, coming back from school or work or, now, the factories.

“I was talking to the interns,” S was saying, as though she didn't know their names, her hands playing imaginary guitar riffs as she walked. That was the danger of music, the songs still lingering in your fingers, irresistible. “You know, that nerdy kid who looks like a jumpy rabbit, and the girl? You know, what’s her name --”

“Odelie, I think,” said Saskia.

“The fuck, I’ll call her O,” said S. She had a habit of shortening names, truncating syllables into clipped, precise sounds. _The Several S’s,_ she would call them. And Lix. “Anyway, she’s -- she’s from the old sunshine state too, _she_ gets my agony.”

“You’re just weak,” said Shandei, rolling her dark eyes; S scoffed exquisitely.

“Weak? Girl, call me when _you’ve_ played for six hours straight. Which one of us had a career before this shit band, huh? And which one of us was cutting teeth in some run-down bar off Sixth in a godawful part of the city --”

“Guys,” said Saskia.

“Well, who got us this deal?” snapped Shandei.

“Through _nepotism_ maybe --”

“ _Guys_ \--”

“Gals!”

That was Iyone’s voice, high and clear, cutting through the cold air and bickering voices. Saskia looked up, eyes narrowed against the frost, to see the older woman hurrying through the snow towards them.

“Gals, it's great to see you here, absolutely swell,” Iyone purred, kissing them each respectively on the cheek. “Are you going for coffee? You must have finished the demo work for the day, then -- Savonn will be so pleased!”

Saskia ducked her head when Shandei shot her an accusing look. It wasn't _her_ fault that Lix had stormed off.

Again.

“Yeah, we did some stuff,” said S, saving the day with her typical eloquence.

“You know, some _music_ stuff,” said Shandei, mockingly tapping her fingers to the beat of an imaginary drum, and then suddenly -- just like that, they were friends again, arms linked, back to back against the world.

 

-

 

Lix was still sulking when they got back, but the main recording room was occupied by several new figures: Savonn, sleek and elegant in a long black pea coat, and Emaris, holding a cup of coffee and a sheaf of papers.

“Oh, hey,” said Savonn, winking, probably at Shandei. “Sis.”

“Bro,” she said, surly, in an even tone. They weren't related, as Shandei liked to remind them, but Emaris was as good as Savonn’s brother, and thus so was Shandei.

“Where’s the knife lady?”

“How would _we_ know,” said S, brushing snowflakes off her coat. “You’re the all-mighty god of recording studios, yeah?”

Savonn snorted, uncharacteristically undignified. “Did you get anything done, at least?”

“Dei’s a smasher on drums,” said Saskia, deadpan.

“Sasi’s talent with words was prewritten,” added S.

“And S is the _best_ with fingering,” finished Shandei, with a raise of one eyebrow. “She has the skills.”

“What skills?” asked S, amused.

“All of them,” said Shandei, throwing herself into a chair and groaning theatrically. “Ugh. I’m so cold, my fingers are numb. I can't play like this.”

“We need L, anyhow,” S pointed out, going to stand behind Shandei and rubbing her shoulders.

“I’ll go get her,” said Saskia, abruptly, making a decision. She ignored the meaningful looks from the others; waved at Emaris, who jumped and nearly spilled Savonn’s drink; and brushed past Odelie -- O? -- on her way out of the room.

 

-

 

They had met purely by chance, what Shandei liked to call the red thread of fate. Saskia had been doing slam poetry in a green café for spare change; Shandei had been playing drums in a lowlife bar for tips; S had been a guitarist in another band that she didn't like to talk about; Lix had been a backup singer in some music video for an up-and-coming new artist, then had gotten signed by pure luck when Savonn, sent to check out the new artist, had set his sights on her instead.

It was a crazy whirlwind of chance and odds, and they're the most insane family Saskia has ever known -- which isn't saying much, given that she doesn't know her real family.

They died from poverty, and the shitty conditions for the poorer class, is the official story SGB Studios puts forth. It makes her a sob story, a tragic artist with a background that she can incorporate into her art.

Really she just writes what comes to mind, and Lix pours out her soul like an upturned glass of cheap back-alley wine, and the publicity grows and grows like a thorny vine she thinks she read about in some poem, long ago.

 

-

 

She can't stop thinking about the scrap of a tune that's been bouncing about in her head like a ping-pong ball ever since Lix slammed the door without a backward glance, so she stops and scrawls on her arm: _You always walk away, but at the end of the day, who else is there for you like I’d be?_ It’s a scrap, honestly, something in the works -- rough draft. She’ll edit it later. She’ll figure something out.

 

-

 

They found Shandei at a bar fight.

By this point the band had been up and running, as much as it could run. “Can’t run on three legs,” S would say, grudgingly. “Dei’s our fourth limb.”

Shandei had brought credence, being related to their manager; it had been another one of those strokes of luck S liked to joke had become karma.

It had been late and they’d been playing at some club, mostly for the free drinks that came along with the gig, and Saskia and S had been crowded by the bar as Lix danced, gyrating her hips like she didn't give a shit about the rest of the club, and then someone had crashed into them.

Then it was pandemonium; fists and screams and teeth and blood, hot and sticky, on Saskia’s fist from where she’d punched someone, and Lix was grabbing her shoulder so hard it hurt and screaming in her ear, _Get out of here, bitch, it's not safe._ Like it was something that needed to be said.

S was there, teeth bared and furious, supporting a girl on her arm. “Bastards tried to touch her,” she hissed, eyes livid. “Let's get out of here.”

And then they were stumbling into the street, the hot muggy air of a New York summer, flies buzzing against the screen door as it crashed shut behind them, blindly seeking the light.

The girl was named Shandei and she was sixteen and her father -- her adopted father, that is -- had just been murdered. “Half-black, half-Japanese, all American,” she called herself, fiery pride vibrating in her voice, and it was easy to see why she’d been attacked: she was pretty, and she wasn't white, and the war was on and people were scared shitless.

“I’ll kill those assholes,” Lix had spit out, wiping blood off Shandei’s dark skin. “Hey, girl. You come with us, yeah? We’ll take care of you.”

“I don't need anyone to take care of me,” Shandei had retorted, eyes sharp as Lix’s stiletto heels, the ones she’d kicked off and that Saskia was now holding, rubbing her thumb absently over the point of the heel like she could chase some lost memory.

“Good,” said S, rolling her eyes. “Now let's go.”

 

-

 

They met S before that, at a gig opened by the guy she backed up, and Savonn was with them, Emaris trailing behind him like a lost puppy only with coffee and a clipboard and a heart made of solid gold, and Savonn had narrowed his eyes at S from across the room and decided, “We need her.”

Lix, beside him, scoffed. She was wearing her usual heavy coat of makeup, disguising the scars on her face. “We don't need anyone else.”

“We need her,” Savonn decided, and that was that.

 

-

 

Later, Saskia found Lix in her room, headphones on, humming to herself. “Hey,” she said, pausing at the ladder. Lix was firmly a top-bunk person, she’d always said so; she didn't seem to notice how claustrophobic Saskia could get, walled in below her. It helped, sometimes, to listen to Lix’s quiet breathing as she slept.

“What,” said Lix, yanking off her headphones.

“Can we talk?”

Lix sighed the sigh of the long-suffering. “Fine. Get up here.” She shifted her legs to make room for Saskia, avoiding eye and skin contact both. “What is it?”

“Are you upset that we're gonna add someone else to the band?”

“It was fine when it was just us,” said Lix, flopping back down on her bed with a groan, seemingly no longer caring about appearances. “I don't see why we need some other chick.”

“Well, neither of us play any instruments, and renting random guys is expensive.”

“God. Always so practical. That's like, the opposite of what I meant,” Lix said, closing her eyes. “ _S._ What kind of shit name is _S_? Talk about straight to the god damn point. It was fine when it was just us. Why can't it stay just us?”

“We’ll still be --” Saskia started, then stopped, because she had been going to say they'd still be friends, but they'd never talked about it and Lix didn't _do_ friends. “We’ll still be us.”

“Pals,” said Lix, flat as day-old champagne. “Gal pals.”

Saskia grinned involuntarily. “Do we still need a band name?”

 

-

 

“Gal Pals,” Savonn said wryly, penciling something on his magical calendar that held them together with fringe and thread and stubborn will not to give up a fight. “You are aware of the stigma associated with that term, right?”

“None of us have AIDS yet,” said Lix, with an easy eye roll that made something in Saskia’s chest feel strained, constricted, like a taut rope about to snap. “Come up with a better one if you want.”

 

-

 

Saskia hesitated with her fist on the doorknob. She felt she should knock. She never knocked -- they stayed in the same room, changed and showered and slept in such close quarters that it hardly mattered -- but something about the closed door made the room seem forbidding.

She opened the door.

Lix was on the bottom bunk, where she’d been sleeping ever since Saskia had panicked one night, curled into the wall as she choked and tried to catch breath that wasn't there, overwhelmed by the closeness of the walls. “I fucking expected this much. What now, huh? Come to berate me for my temper?”

“No,” said Saskia. She sat down next to Lix and held out a hand.

Lix eyed her suspiciously.

“Friends?” asked Saskia. “It's how they do it in film.”

“You’re such a loser,” said Lix, but she shook Saskia’s hand anyway. “Wait, what's that written on your arm?”

Saskia blushed and yanked her hand away. “I -- nothing. Lyrics or whatever. Something I thought of, earlier. It's nothing. They're stupid, anyway.”

“Nothing you write is stupid,” said Lix, and reached out to take her hand again.

 

-

 

“Hello, New _York_ ,” crooned Shandei, tossing her head back. Gripping the edge of the fire escape, she reached out and tapped ash off the end of her cigarette. The wind caught the debris and swirled it away.

“Drama queen,” said S, cupping her hand to shield her match.

Saskia leaned against the railing, taking in the swell and expanse of the city. Up here, anything was possible; up here, she never had to be afraid again.

“We’ll see where we go next,” said Lix, brooding but strangely lighthearted, and she slid the cold fingers of her hand -- the one not holding a cigarette -- into Saskia’s coat pocket, clinging tightly to her like she never wanted to let go.

 

-

 

“Seattle,” suggested Savonn, flipping through his list. “Portland, maybe. Pick somewhere, ladies, the world is waiting.”

  
“We'll see where the road takes us,” said Emaris with a shy grin as he handed out coffees, and Saskia wrapped her cold fingers around her mug, leaned back, and waited for the lyrics to come to her.

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr](spacestationtrustfund.tumblr.com).


End file.
